Need, want, desire
by Ophelia1983
Summary: A woman in love with love. A man surrendered to mad love. A double story, a love triangle. A femme fatale actress. The "boy" that will never grow up and the man that hurts and waits.
1. Preface

**Preface**

* * *

_**There's the love. Dead on the bed. Killed by love.**_ Wooden body, fake. Polished to provoke.

You should have tasted me. Try to know this thing, this body. It was so easy for you to drag your bareness on the street and impossible for me to get out of my mind's hideout.

And you came. You came here the night that everyone was missing. I wonder if I would recognize you in the daylight.

You stood across from me with your head tilted. Full of promises. That was it… Some voices were screaming,

"Away… Stay away…"

I hated them.

_What the fuck,_ I thought, _aren't the ignorants dead? Are they still behind my door?_

Another night I heard you say,

"I never love"

I stayed up all night looking at you. I stayed up caressing you.

And another night that I could see me fall asleep, being empty, I heard you - yes - I heard you say

"I love you".

In the infinitude of the dream I wept for a second of happiness. If only I could keep it…


	2. Chapter 1

He stood still for a while. To realize what he had read. Then he looked at some words separately. _"… Love… Killed by love", "wooden body…polished…", "… I wonder if I would recognize you in the daylight", "… aren't the ignorants dead?", "… a second of happiness" …_

Then the he looked at the handwriting. Letters sloped towards the right, carved harshly on the white paper. He wondered what striked him more, the text or the handwriting? Or both?

"Is this your notebook?" he asked her, knowing it was hers.

She picked it up lightly from his hands. She had been looking for it for days. She had forgotten it in her kindergarten class. But what did it matter? How much would it matter?

"I read… part of it, a page", he told her looking for the right word. "The last one specifically."

She looked at him without uttering a word.

"I don't know why I did it but… I did, it happened. I mean… I did it."

She shrugged her shoulders. She got goose bumps, like she had just gotten out of her warm bed sheets.

"I want to know you."

"How do you know a woman?"

"You tell me."

"You said you read. You read me."

"That's why I want to know you."

"I work here, in your wife's school. I am a kindergarten teacher."

"Yes."

"I am married to a bookseller and my house is full of books. My husband says that I shouldn't be so influenced by books and he wants me to cut down on reading."

"I really want to know you."

I love children and I love my job. I feel lucky that I am doing a job that really speaks to my heart."

"Yes."

"I cut myself with a knife the other day instead of slicing a lemon. I am so clumsy most of the time."

"I really want to know you."

"I am trying to satisfy you."

"Smile for me and perhaps I'll understand. Once I see a smile, I never let it go."

"Are you certain of that?"

"Who talked about certainty?"

"There… You made me smile."

"Good, very good."

"You smiled too."

"So?"

"Good, good."

He reached his hand and touched her clenched fingers over the notebook. Their fingers intertwined immediately.

"I'd left the notebook here on purpose. I knew you came here some times to read your financial papers. I hoped that you would find it, that you might be curious enough to browse through it. I left it here about a month ago. Until I forgot about it. I looked for it sometimes at home. How silly I am. It was then that I started losing hope. The hope for you to "see" me. I noticed you from the first day I set foot here. You were driving your jeep. You parked outside the school… Your… wife was sitting next to you. I looked at you and… what can I say? Then you got off the car with her. "Why?" I thought. "Why?". She is so beautiful. How come some women are so beautiful?"

He was looking at her without managing to hear everything she said. He just took in what she was giving out.

_Why her in particular?_ He thought. She doesn't have anything that appealing.

"Your wife and my headmistress is a very beautiful woman. Glorious, noble, charming. She's got everything. You're very lucky."

So she read his mind! Who was she anyway? What was she besides a simple kindergarten teacher?

"As you can see, I am nothing compared to her. And you might be thinking that I am not worthy of you… of her…"

He saw her lowering her head to hide the sorrow in her eyes. He tightened his fist at her words so that he wouldn't grab her and press his burning lips on hers.

"A woman does not have to be good looking to be a woman." He whispered losing touch with his surroundings.

"I like what you just said."

She smiled at him like a little girl. Like the most innocent girl in the whole world.

"I borrowed this skirt from my mother and the shirt from my sister. I don't have anything really nice to wear. I mean nice for my workplace. But I am completely satisfied with what I have. My books, my world that is, my corner beside the fireplace, my reality…"

She stopped and took a deep breath. Teachers were coming and going. Who could suspect them of anything?

"I want to feel you. I want you to live for me even for a few moments. I won't ask anything more of you, I promise. I want to see your face in my hands. I want your laughter. Your childishness. I want you."

It scared him. He had just told her he wanted to know her without really knowing what it was that he wanted while she was perfectly clear.

"I want you" she told him "even for a little while."

"What if it gets out?"

"It will come out only if we want it too."

"It is strange, I knew the notebook was yours without having seen you leave it here. The first day I saw it here, your image came to my mind. As you were walking up the stairs, remember when we met on the stairs one day?"

"Yes, we both turned back and looked at each other. Your wife was with you. It was the same day I left the notebook here. You looked at me while your wife was on your side. You believe your wife is very beautiful, don't you?"

"What do you mean "very beautiful"?"

"I mean superior. Ideal. Yes. What can you dream about when you're living with a miracle? You have everything. What more can you hope for? Nothing."

While she was talking, while she was placing those last words one after the other, he saw in front of him, in her eyes, himself bare… Surrendered in her arms.

"My wife told me: "I hired a kindergarten teacher today but I don't know if I really like her. Her resume was very good but I had a lot more that were much better. Why did I hire her? Because she has a strange charm without being beautiful. Maybe you'll meet her someday." That's what she said."

"I thank her."

"For what?"

"For talking to you about me. She did it without knowing the good she did me."

"Yes."

"Say something."

"We've been talking for quite a while. We don't want to draw anyone's attention."

"You wanted to know me."

"How do you explain that?"

"What?"

"What can I say? How can someone figure women out?"

"I'm really simple. Very simple. I know me, that's why I'm telling you this with such certainty. I am simple."

"Yes, that's true."

She smiled at him and he tangled himself in the simplicity of her smile. Then he turned his back on her and left her looking at him. Late at night he thought about her as he took off his shoes, hang his jacket, loosened his tie. His wife was relaxing in the tub. She was beautiful.

He thought about her writing in the notebook near the fireplace and her husband, the bookseller, throwing wood in the fire. Maybe he would make love to her there, in her favorite spot. He wondered how often. And how? Did they take all of their clothes off or…? He threw his underwear in a corner and got into the bathtub.

He couldn't get comfortable and got out after a while. He wrapped a towel around his waist and lit up a cigarette. He thought about something that made him smile once in a while. A smile that reminded him of this morning. A smile that mimicked the one that was on her lips. Hers…

He didn't dream about her that night. Or was that rough sea that drowned him in his sleep really her? He didn't see her anywhere the next day. Nor the day after. The third day, Saturday morning, he saw her from afar carrying super market bags. He slowed down to watch her. Heavy steps, casual clothes, hair up in a sloppy pony tail. A blank expression on her face. He tore his eyes away from her and stepped on the gas.


End file.
